


Pop Quiz

by cubbiebunkie



Category: Veronica Mars (TV), Veronica Mars - All Media Types
Genre: Character Study, Comfort/Angst, Developing Relationship, Drama, Drama & Romance, Established Relationship, F/M, Light Angst, Love, Romance, Trust Issues
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-03
Updated: 2020-05-03
Packaged: 2021-03-01 17:53:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 873
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23981131
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cubbiebunkie/pseuds/cubbiebunkie
Summary: Logan thinks about Veronica.
Relationships: Logan Echolls/Veronica Mars, Love - Relationship
Comments: 6
Kudos: 29





	Pop Quiz

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Chichuri](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Chichuri/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Proof of Trust](https://archiveofourown.org/external_works/614962) by Chichuri. 



> This is a quarantine-induced, 3 AM, heavy edit inspired by Chichuri's 2006 original on FF.
> 
> Hastily done amid a strange cloud of half-dreams, my singular intent is to celebrate Chichuri's keen and introspective character study. Thank you deeply.

_______________

Pop quiz. Starting with an easy one. Question: Why, when one has an annoyingly doubtful, incessantly prying girlfriend, would one deliberately be evasive as to his whereabouts and motives? Answer: When one is deliberately, masochistically baiting said girlfriend for the twisted pleasure of exposing their underlying trust issues. More specifically, _her_ underlying lack of trust in him.

Logan knows he should really stop being surprised when Veronica barrels forward, blinders on, to snatch up the bait. Everything he’s done has been designed to tap into her suspicions and insecurities. He’d almost be disappointed if she reacted any other way. It’s not even unexpected that she tracked his cell phone.

Tracking someone by following their cell’s GPS signal? Hot. At least when you’re the one watching, and not the one being tracked. And even worse, he found that she’d activated his GPS chip not out of concern for his well being, but out of the desire to catch him in the midst of wrongdoing.

Logan waxes nostalgic, recalling the days when one Veronica Mars wrongly accused him of everything from credit card fraud to election tampering, later upgrading her accusations to include murder and rape. Shocker. He’d have thought her perpetual series of misguided accusations would have triggered some sort of realization that possibly, just maybe, she had grossly underestimated his abilities as an evildoer. But alas, for such a bright little minx, she could be awfully dense once an idea caught her.

Even now, he’s guilty until proven innocent. And even then, the proof never completely satisfies her. No matter how much he struggles to redeem himself to her, he can never move beyond the cutting betrayal of his words, and the blunt trauma of his actions. Her pain still sits behind those guileless blue eyes, waiting to balance everything he’ll ever do against every sin he’s ever done. Every crime and every transgression will count against him forever. No number of heroics, no amount of goodness, will erase them.

Sometimes, in the haze of boozed up contemplation, he thinks he understands. New Veronica is too bitter and too jaded to trust anyone but herself. New Veronica is too stubborn to consider someone else’s point of view. And New Veronica is too scared of being hurt to lay out her emotions. Old Veronica died with Lilly, and Logan built up this New Veronica from the throes of his pain and rage. He made her this way. And God help him, he’s been so fucking in love her, for what seems like forever, that no matter how much she pushes him away, punishes him, betrays him, torments him, he’ll just step right back up for more.

So he courts her paranoia, then lashes out when his efforts are rewarded. He figures, no matter what he does, she’ll find an excuse to doubt him anyway. She’s already picking at his lack of class attendance. His lack of enthusiasm for her highbrow entertainments. His lack of fire in a fight. She’s already taking the word of someone she dislikes over his own. She’s already exhibiting the warning signs he too vividly remembers from the last time she carefully shattered his heart.

So he pushes. And he prods. And he baits. Hoping to God that he’s reading the signals wrong. That he doesn’t know her half as well as he thinks he does. That maybe, just maybe, she wants this thing between them just as much as he does. That there's actually room for him in her heart.

So of course Logan breaks a little when he finds a tracking device hiding under the dashboard of his car. Sure, he half expected it, after his “plans for weekend” rant the previous night, but his heart clenches all the same. Veronica has free access to his suite, his car, his entire life. But she still doesn’t believe what he says. She’ll never trust him. No matter how much he bares himself to her, she'll always believe there’s a deceitful layer underneath.

And hours later, a stone still in his stomach, a tension that still thrums through his body, he returns to his car. To search for more reminders of his misery? Who knows. But when he runs a compulsive hand under the dash to find it-- it’s, it’s not here. 

He reaches down again. Deeper toward the back this time. Runs both hands along the back of the molded plastic. Nothing. Shines the light of his phone around for better visibility. Cranes his neck to peer into the harder to reach places. He’s almost got his face to the floorboards when it hits him. The tracking device is gone.

So pop quiz. Extra credit now. Question: What does one do when the obsessively suspicious, achingly troublesome love of one’s life takes the bait, but then drops it? Answer: One can’t be sure. But maybe, just maybe, the answer is to grab onto this shard of hope with both hands and hold it tight, as hard as you can. Hold this lifeline close to remind yourself: Stop. Stop finding your heartbeat in the drama. Stop affirming your fears with sabotage. There _is_ room for you.

There is room for him.  
Logan leans back in his seat and sighs.

**Author's Note:**

> Comments, criticisms, questions, and the like are accepted and appreciated.


End file.
